City of Gallup water customers in three areas may be affected by an unscheduled water outage March 9 from 1 pm-7 pm:

● 100-200 block of East Highway 66

● 100 block of South First Street

● 100-200 block of East Coal Avenue

Surrounding areas may also experience low water pressure.

The Water Department will be repairing a broken water line in the area and will need to shut off the water in order to do their work safely.

If you have questions, please contact Utility Dispatch at (505) 863-1200 or call Nicole Hawthorne with the Water Department at (505) 879-5722.

Gallup water customers in the area of 108 and 201 E. Coal Ave. and 208 and 218 E. Hwy. 66 and in surrounding areas may experience low water pressure or a water outage, due to an unscheduled water outage, announced by the Water Department, which will be making repairs to a broken water line in the area from 7 am until 1 pm.

They will turn off the water in order to work safely.

Any questions can be directed to Utility Dispatch at (505) 863-1200 OR TO Nicole Hawthorne with the water Department at (505) 879-5722.

SANTA FE — All schools could be in full reentry by April 5.  All New Mexico school staff members will be offered a COVID-19 vaccine before the end of March as a gateway to further expanding safe in-person learning with a goal of reaching full reentry by April 5, the Public Education Department and Department of Health announced March 8.

The announcement moves New Mexico public schools to the third and final stage of the Public Education Department’s COVID-19 Safe Operating Categories. All schools were in the remote category until Sept. 8; most elementary schools were eligible for the hybrid category in the fall; all schools became eligible for the hybrid category Feb. 8; and all schools are now eligible for full reentry, which means all students can return to their school buildings for in-person instruction each school day.

“Our goal has always been to welcome students back to school as quickly and safely as possible. The statewide mobilization to vaccinate all school staff is a game-changer in creating increasingly safe working conditions and school environments for all,” Public Education Secretary Ryan Stewart said.

More than 45,000 New Mexicans have registered as educators to receive the vaccine, which  includes those in early childhood and higher education. Of the registered educators, almost 15,000 have already received the vaccine as members of previously eligible groups — health care workers; those 75 and older, and those with certain health conditions that place them at high risk for serious outcomes should they become infected.

New Mexico currently has 50,864 K-12 school staff members — including classroom teachers, administrators, bus drivers and food handlers.

Once school staff members provide evidence of full vaccination, they will no longer be required to participate in asymptomatic surveillance testing, which is used to prevent outbreaks. Since school reentry began Sept. 8, the overall positivity rate of school staff surveillance testing is one percent, well below the state’s five percent target. The positivity rate since the expansion of in-person learning on Feb. 8 is point-three percent.

“We are phasing out what we’ve been calling ‘hybrid’ learning, although there will continue to be a fully remote option for those families who choose it,” Stewart said.

In no case will a student be required to return to in-person learning, if doing so would violate the requirements of a sovereign tribe or nation, some of which are still in a “lockdown” environment.

Extracurricular activities and sports

Sports and other extracurricular activities may resume immediately at all schools, with explicit safety precautions in place.

For sports, precautions include no congregating during warm-ups or breaks in play; no overnight travel, and masks required for all except when eating or drinking.

Choir and band will be allowed outdoors. Students may not share instruments and must follow COVID-safe practices, such as the use of cloth bell covers on wind instruments. Both singers and musicians must be appropriately masked and must maintain enhanced social distancing of nine feet when playing or singing in groups.

Diné Artist honors grandmother through craft

Life on the Navajo reservation helped shape 39-year-old Diné artisan Philander Begay. Begay is a Navajo artist who has won numerous awards for his jewelry at the Inter-tribal Indian Ceremonial, Santa Fe shows, and the Heard Museum.

Begay remembers hanging on the skirt tails of his grandmother in Round Rock, Ariz., as she would teach him things about the Diné culture. They would walk together as his grandmother pointed out certain things about the land. One of the things he learned about was the horned toad.

“My grandma would find one, pick it up, and pray for it as well as bless it. She would talk to it and say it would give me good luck in my life.”

The horned toad was from his grandma, ever since he was little his grandma would pray and bless the horned toad. She would talk to it and give us good luck from it.”

Since then, he has lived all over the Southwest and made Gallup his home in 2012,

Begay is now creating beautiful jewelry designed from the horned toad among other inspirations he was taught by his grandmother.

He specializes in tufa cast. Tufa is a sedimentary rock made up of limestone.

Tufa cast is the process of carving a mold into volcanic ash using the carving as the negative space into which precious stones are inlaid along with 14-karat or 18-karat gold  and silver, and of course, patience and time.

His unique style is highly sought-after. Even before the item is finished, it is often already spoken for and sold.

Some of Begay’s jewelry incorporates pueblo styles. He says he’s always been influenced by various pueblo ruins around New Mexico and by Anasazi images on pottery shards he would come across. He often wondered what became of them [the Anasazi people]. With these pictures in his mind, he began crafting those images into his bracelets.

“I inlay like how the Anasazi put together the bricks as they would put their homes together,” he said.

His wife Shanibah and son, Isiah Begay, also help with casting and inlays. Begay makes bracelets, rings, pendants, concho belts, and bolo ties. The most expensive piece Begay sold was around $20,000 for a concho belt.

He never thought that doing this type of art would create a comfortable living for his family.

“I’ve always been an artisan since I was a kid,” he said. “I remember drawing a landscape of my grandma’s place in Round Rock. (laughing), I even try to sell it for $3. I remember my dad would draw horses and I wanted to draw like him. I remember helping out my cousin with his jewelry and just picked it up there.”

Begay said with the artistic influence from his father and cousin, his career unfolded naturally. Begay’s jewelry is singular. He doesn’t claim to follow any particular style, and he has no boundaries with his creations.

Begay was fortunate to have partnered with some of the Gorman Galleries, in Taos, Santa Fe, and Scottsdale, Ariz. to showcase his work. This partnership has continued for 12 years, helping him, and supporting him along his journey.

“I like the way we worked and here we are running a gallery that just opened up here in downtown Gallup. It’s like a dream come true. It’s all falling in place and feels like it’s meant to be.”

Begay says he wants to pursue other areas of art like painting and has already begun trying his hand at it. Even though COVID has slowed many businesses, it was the opposite for Begay. He says it gave him more time catch up on orders that he needs to finish.

He loves what he does and asked if there was anything else he would choose to be doing instead – he simply said he couldn’t imagine doing anything else but creating beauty that he hopes will still be here when he is long gone.

For more information on Philander Begay Jewelry, visit his web site: philanderbegay.net call (505) 409-3916, or visit 202 W. Coal Ave. in Gallup.

By Dee Velasco
For the Sun